The Canadian People's Food Policy Project has delivered their report after two years' consultations with 3500 Canadians in 250 kitchen table talks. Grounded in the principles of Food Sovereignty, the key recommendations include:

Ensuring that food is eaten as close as possible to where it is produced (e.g. domestic/regional purchasing policies for institutions and large food retailers, community-supported agriculture, local farmers markets, etc.).

Supporting food providers in a widespread shift to ecological production in both urban and rural settings (e.g. organic agriculture, community-managed fisheries, indigenous food systems, etc.), including policies for the entry of new farmers into agriculture.

Creating a nationally-funded Children and Food strategy (including school meal programs, school gardens, and food literacy programs) to ensure that all children at all times have access to the food required for healthy lives.

Ensuring that the public, especially the most marginalized, are actively involved in decisions that affect the food system.

At a time when the Australian Federal Government is about to launch a national consultation to establish, for the first time in our history, a national food policy for Australia, this document, and the work that went into its construction, is a timely reminder of the need for food systems to be built in a participatory and democratic manner. This is what AFSA has been urging the Federal Government to do, and we call on all Australians who care about a sustainable, resilient and fair food future to do the same.

Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig's National Food Policy Advisory Group has missed an opportunity. Its 'big food' members are unlikely to promote wider participation or embrace a new vision for the future of food and farming in Australia. With oil and phosphates running out and the climate changing, industrial agriculture must evolve into ecological farming systems.

"We welcome the Minister's initiative in focusing on food sovereignty and security as it is long overdue”, said the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (AFSA) national spokesperson Michael Croft.

However, the membership of this Advisory Group represents the big food production and distribution interests that generate problems and crises, not solutions. This Food Council represents the status quo of the existing system – Minister Ludwig has missed a real opportunity to introduce an inclusive representation of food networks. If food security is the real issue, who in this group speaks for the thousands of Australians who go to bed hungry each night?[/quote]

In its 17 December, 2010 Media Release on the Food Policy Advisory Group, the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance says that the announcement by the Australian Government of a National Food Policy Advisory Group is a step in the right direction of an integrated national food policy.

As currently constituted however, its membership represents more of the same thinking that has generated problems and crises in our food and farming systems. There is an urgent need for bodies of this sort to be more inclusive of the innovative individuals and organisations who are leading the way towards a truly sustainable and resilient food secure future for all Australians.

The new Federal Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Senator Joe Ludwig, has replied to the letter the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance (ADFA) sent to his predecessor, Tony Burke, prior to the August federal election.

A summary

In his letter to the AFSA, the Minister undertakes to consult widely in the formation of a national food plan, 'particularly from stakeholders with a strong interest in the central issues'.

It is a small but significant step that the Federal Government has recognised the legitimacy of normally-excluded voices in the formation of a national food policy for this country.

It is also a small but significant step towards the recognition of the legitimacy of the principles of Food Sovereignty in national political and policy thinking. The work ahead of us is now to ensure that these principles are not only recognised in national policy, but that they are implemented.

In August 2010, the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance produced a letter supporting the participation of the social enterprise and small food business sector, as well as the community food sector, in the development of a national policy on food.

The letter has been circulated and a number of organisations and individuals active in food systems, in food education and food issues have signed. The letter is to go to:

A modest proposal

The letter proposes that the formulation of a national policy on food should be a democratic process involving the full range of food interests. The Alliance is concerned that only large corporate organisations would be included in its formulation and that this could skew the emphasis of a policy away from building a resilient food system in Australia that is inclusive of farmers (including market gardeners and small farmers), food processors and distributors including the emerging community-based food distribution systems.

The Alliance believes that economic scale and power should not be the sole criteria for participation in the formulation of a national policy on food. Our food system would work better by recognising the social value of diversity in food systems in delivering citizens the type of food they prefer at a price they can afford. Market conditions force the small, community-based food initiatives and the social enterprise and small, for-profit food businesses to be innovative in their work. This can only add value to any deliberation over a national policy on food.